April 2026
Congratulations to Dr. Laura Raynolds, Professor of Sociology, who is retiring from CSU after 32 years of service. Laura is internationally known as the Co-Founder & Co-Director of the Center for Fair & Alternative Trade (CFAT) as well as for many accomplishments near and far including a John N. Stern Distinguished Professor Award and a Rural Sociological Society Excellence in Research Award.
Many thanks to all who joined us in honoring Laura! Stay tuned for a look back at her impactful career and global service.
Dr. KuoRay Mao and Ph.D. student Yue Xu published their article "Climate adaptation and institutional continuity: Understanding lock-in dynamics in China's grassland governance" in the Chinese Journal of Sociology.
This study examines grassland management in Inner Mongolia, China, using the adaptive lock-in framework to analyze how state-driven adaptive approaches and dynamics have evolved within China’s grassland governance system and how they shape climate vulnerability and local adaptive capacity over time.
With support from the Sociology Community Advancement Funds, Dr. Joshua Sbicca and the Prison Agriculture Lab was able to fund one graduate student to complete data collection and clean a data set. The project collected and organized public records from every state department of correction containing five years’ worth of the following information: the names of all companies who have bought prisoner-produced agricultural products, the revenues generated by departments of correction from prisoner-produced agricultural products, and the quantity sold of prisoner-produced agricultural products by type. This effort builds on two years of consulting with two Associated Press journalists as part of a nationwide investigation of the exploitation of incarcerated agricultural workers.
Rebecca Whitten, who received her M.A. in the Department of Sociology, was critical to this massive project. She kept excellent records and was well organized, working in GitHub and R to create what will ultimately be a publicly available data set. Support from the department put the most labor-intensive part of the project behind us. We will now create data visualizations and papers from the data set.
Many thanks to this year's presenters and to Amber Obermaier for organizing Sociology's annual Graduate Student Symposium.
Emilia Ravetta: "Temporal Legacies of Lithium Mining: Displacement, Individualization, and Alternative Futures"
Katrina Cloyes and Carissa Fostervold: "Organized Labor, Inequality, and Ecological Disempowerment: A Cross-National Assessment"
Liberty Macias: "Public Perceptions of Survival Crimes: Examining Culpability, Deservingness, and Punitive Responses"
Yue Xu: "From Grain to Sea: China's Seafood Production Regime and the Blue Frontier of Accumulation"
Kaitlin Dute: "The Boundaries of Illegality: The Impact of U.S. State-Level Policy on Mexican immigrant Mental Health"
Polina Kopeikin:"Contaminated Waters: How Social Demographics Can Be Predictors of Heavy Metals in Community Water Systems"
Incoming Ph.D. student Nowrin Fatema is one of three outstanding doctoral students who have been awarded the Graduate School’s Land Grant Fellowship this year.
Norwin "will begin her doctoral work in the Department of Sociology. She earned her M.S. in sociology from Utah State University, along with prior advanced study in disaster management and environmental and forestry fields. She has held applied research and program roles with the UN World Food Programme in Bangladesh, supporting humanitarian operations in the world’s largest refugee settlement. In her graduate research, she collaborated with more than two dozen immigrant- and refugee-serving organizations to keep her work grounded in community priorities. She also served as the elected president of a refugee services organization, demonstrating sustained commitment and trust from community partners. In 2025, she received several honors, including Master’s Researcher of the Year, the Presidential Award for Community Engagement and a Sustainability Award." – CSU Source article written by Cheyenne Dolin
Congratulations to the many SOC students who presented at this year's Celebrate Undergraduate Research and Creativity (CURC) Showcase!
Ashlyn Murray, Isabel Pineda, Tea Benzenberg, Trinity Yamagata: "Beyond the Home: Foster Care Experiences" – Dr. Janelle Viera, Mentor – Hear from this team of HDFS and SOC students!
Arelys Gamboa: "Wage Theft Among Low-Income Workers"
Pi Blehm: "The Structure of Global Migration & Citizens Attitudes Toward Immigration"
Jay Bates Domenech: "Erasing the Spectrum: Intersectional Exclusions of Autism in Television"
Sophia Archuleta-Sanchez: "The Effects of ICE's increased activity on Latine Students’ Mental Health and Academic Mindsets"
Colin Hoffman: "Social Clinical Communication"
Cheyenne Moser "Ultra-Violence and Sexualization of Women in Horror Over the Decades"
Leila Kister: "Social Reactions to Disclosure of Alcohol and/or Drug Involved Sexual Assault and Its Impact on Survivors" – Dr. Erin O’Callaghan, Mentor
Thank you, Dr. Elena Windsong, for elevating the department's involvement with our amazing students!
Expand your social network! Intern. Embrace non-linear career paths! Seize surprising opportunities. Take initiative. Most importantly… follow your why! CSU SOC alumni spoke to the power of these & more during our annual alumni panel.
Many thanks to the students, faculty, staff, alumni and families who joined us! An extra shoutout to these six panelists:
Chris Bland ’11, Sergeant, Fort Collins Police Services
Savanna Bunnell ’17, Senior Community Case Specialist, Larimer County Community Corrections
Caitlin Drysdale ’18, Sr. Lifecycle Marketing Strategist, MERGE
Becca Eman ’17, Senior Analyst, Colorado, Division of Youth Services
Alexandra Kotaba ’25, Law Clerk, Second Judicial District Courthouse in Denver, Criminal Division
Ben Schrader ‘09, Director of Adult Learner and Veteran Services, CSU
Follow along on social media as we post more about the impact they’re each having, their career journeys, and their valuable insights on student success.
Dr. Pat Mahoney kindly visited SOC students during CURC and congratulated Sophia Archuleta-Sanchez on her hard work!
Dr. Tara Opsa, Dr. Stephanie Malin, and Professor Jason Downing were honored during CLA's All-College meeting. Stay tuned for details!
Please continue to submit your news and events to Sociology's Communications Coordinator. Thank you!